


Black Cosmos

by abelmoschus-bunch (roryfreisthler), clararegenerated (roryfreisthler)



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005), The Scrolls of Rassilon
Genre: Abusive Parents, Angst, Angst and Feels, Born to save the Doctor, Canon Compliant, Canon Non-Binary Character, Canon-Typical Behavior, Clara is a Control Freak, Continuity What Continuity, Destruction of Gallifrey (Doctor Who), Don't Like Don't Read, Established Relationship, F/M, Gallifrey, Gallifrey Bashing, Gallifrey isn't a nice place, Gen, Immortality, Medical Trauma, Mild Sexual Content, Mindfuck, Minor Omega/Rassilon (Doctor Who), Missing Scene, Mostly Canon Compliant, Nonbinary Doctor (Doctor Who), Pet Names, Post-Episode: s12e10 The Timeless Children, Rassilon Bashing, Regeneration (Doctor Who), Social Commentary, Suicidal Thoughts, The Doctor (Doctor Who) Uses They/Them Pronouns, Unethical Experimentation, canon-typical abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 10:27:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30070842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roryfreisthler/pseuds/abelmoschus-bunch, https://archiveofourown.org/users/roryfreisthler/pseuds/clararegenerated
Summary: During an encounter at a bar with the Spy Master, Clara realises that she was never able to protect the Doctor as much as she wanted to be able to.
Relationships: Ashildr | Lady Me/Clara Oswin Oswald, The Doctor & Clara Oswin Oswald, The Doctor & Tecteun (Doctor Who), The Doctor & The Master (Doctor Who), The Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who), The Master (Dhawan)/Clara Oswin Oswald, The Master/Clara Oswin Oswald
Kudos: 5





	Black Cosmos

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [White Entitlement and Doctor Who: AKA Why I Like The Timeless Child](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/777273) by skzloona. 



> I tried to make the "born to save the Doctor" and "The Doctor is the Timeless Child" plot twists work together. Not sure how well it worked.
> 
> Contains notable amounts of Rassilon and Gallifrey bashing due to, well... the pairing that this work centers on. DL;DR.

“One Black Cosmos, please,” Clara says to the bartender. Yes, it’s one of the strongest drinks at this particular establishment, but that’s what she needs tonight.

Apparently, Gallifrey has been destroyed, and she’s not really sure what that means for her immortality. If facing the Raven is a fixed point in time, but she was removed from the time stream by the Time Lords, how exactly is she going to go back? Not that she wants to, mind you. But she also really doesn’t want to think about how universe-ending it could be if she never comes the long way around. The way Gallifrey was destroyed this time makes it difficult to go to different time points of it, since it was stored in a fixed pocket universe. She also doesn’t really want to see Lady Me right now. She’s sure she’ll cool off eventually, and her girlfriend understands, but right now she’s having a hard time not holding the possible implosion of time against her, regardless of how irrational it is.

  
“Long day, sweetheart?” A strange man slides into the seat next to her, looking at her with dark eyes.

  
“A long life,” Clara laughs, and watches the bartender prepare her drink. She doesn’t like strange men calling her pet names, but she figures if she looks boring enough to him he’ll go away.

  
“Surely you can’t be that old yet, Puppy,” There’s that smirk - the one she recognises as the beginning of something dark. Her stomach sinks as she battles with conflicting feelings, staring into the eyes of her old nemesis-turned-lover, trying not to melt at Missy’s chosen pet name for her. A regeneration, surely - this man is just as handsome if not more than the reincarnations she knew of preceding Missy, but he seems a bit more unhinged. She’ll have to be more careful with him. 

  
“Have you never heard that it’s not polite to call someone you haven’t met yet pet names?” Clara retorts as the bartender puts her drink down in front of her, then takes a swig.

  
“Oh, but I’ve met you,” There’s a warm hand on her leg, and sparks shoot through her. “The question is, do you want to meet this new version of me?”

  
There’s been an irresistible attraction between her and every version of the Master she’s met - one time, she even ended up in a threesome with him and his beautiful blonde wife without him knowing who she was. She knows that even if she tries, she won’t be able to deny the attraction that’s already between her and this version. “I always do,”

  
“Then put down that silly drink and come back to my place,” The Master’s voice is warm against her ear, and she shivers. “I don’t think you want to be too drunk to think clearly for this.”

  
That’s true. It’s already difficult enough to think clearly when she’s with the Master in general. 

  
***  
“Is there anyone I should be worried about coming after me for this?” The Master asks in a melodic voice as they walk into the bedroom of his TARDIS.

  
“No. Ashildr knows I’m unbreakable,” Clara says, looking up at the Master with a proud look in her eyes.

  
“Unbreakable, huh? Well, there really is no point in breaking my toys,” The Master lets out a dark chuckle as he scoops her up and pushes her down onto the soft bed. She doesn’t resist. There’s no point to resisting, until he enters her mind.

  
“You’ve jumped into our dear friend’s timeline, but have you really saved them as much as you think you have?” The Master is dancing around the inside of her mind while his physical form plays with her body. Memories swim around them, hazier than they would normally be because of how he’s touching her body.

  
“Of course I’ve saved them. I was born to,” Clara’s voice comes out more uncertain that she would like it to. 

  
“Perhaps you were only born to save the Doctor. Not to save the Timeless Child,” The Master is all around her, breathing on her neck and dancing through her memories, the hazy recollections of her echo selves. 

  
“Who is the Timeless Child?” The name sounds familiar, but Clara can’t place it. 

  
The Master laughs, a gleeful laugh that chills Clara to the bone. “Do you want me to show you, puppy?” As he asks the question, Clara can feel her physical body arching up as waves of pleasure overcome her, and she shakes, clutched around the Master’s body. This time feels more dangerous than the other times. She’s not sure she likes this particular meeting of the two of them anymore. 

  
“I need to know,” Clara says.

  
“Good puppy,” The Master purrs, and puts an arm around her waist, inside her mind. Clara blinks, and they’re being pulled into a different world.

  
***  
The world looks like Gallifrey, but like a Gallifrey before the Intuitive Revolution. Far before the Intuitive Revolution. A scientist who Clara thinks she recognises the energetic signature of from portraits - but that’s impossible, this is the Doctor’s past, the Doctor didn’t know them, the Doctor studied them as a brilliant historical figure at the Academy - watches their child fall from a tall hill while playing. By all rights, the child should die, head broken open on the hard rock. But gold light emerges from the child’s limbs, and regeneration energy surrounds them, changing their body.

  
The other children and the older Gallifreyan look on in shock, the older Gallifreyan crying, until the child lifts their head up from the ground, their dark skin a harsh contrast against the orange slopes. “Mom? What happened?”

  
From then on, the mother is focused on figuring out what gives the child their power. Against their will, despite their cries, she forces them into test upon test to extract the power that enables their DNA to be re-written and them to be brought back to life. The child dies time and time again, confined mostly to a stark laboratory while the other children of Gallifrey play, attend school, and grow older. The mother grows older too. Obsessed with unlocking the secret in their body, she becomes isolated from the rest of the world as her hair turns gray and her skin grows wrinkles. Time and time again, the Timeless Child dies. Time and time again, they’re brought back to life, only to return to their gray prison. She hears them whisper that they don’t want to come back, far too many times. 

  
Finally, their mother unlocks the cure. She parades through the Citadel, the mysterious “Other” founder who gave the virus that enables transformation into a Time Lord to Rassilon, the first and longest president of Gallifrey, and Omega, his right-hand man and devoted lover. The poorer Gallifreyans outside the Citadel, the Drylanders, die en masse compared to the richer ones in the Citadel with better access to Healers to help them survive the harrowing virus. And all the while, the Timeless Child is hidden away from society, a dark shadow highlighting the golden blight of Time Lord society, the one who was their salvation and creation but who is never given credit. 

  
Then their memory is erased, and they are Loomed as a young girl, running through the bright red grass with her best enemy, two children from Great Houses of Gallifrey who will be the future. 

  
Clara now understands more than she already did why they ran. Why their best friend, aware of how misplaced they felt in society but not sure why, ran too.  
And how she was only able to save the other half of the Hybrid in part of their history.

  
“You see now why I had no choice but to destroy Gallifrey. It is and has always been built on a lie. Built on the subjugation and destruction of the weakest members of its society, to uplift tyrants such as Rassilon and Tecteun. The Other.” The Master hisses, and through his presence in her mind, through the strange Gallifreyan touch telepathy, Clara can feel his pain. She rushes to him, pushing her lips onto his, desperate for the closest connection she can have to the brilliant being her echoes dedicate their lives to protecting.

  
And then she returns to reality, panting on a bed next to the man who is so strange and yet so familiar. 

  
“You understand why I did it, don’t you, puppy?” The pools of The Master’s eyes search Clara’s own, hoping for understanding. 

  
“Yes,” Clara says, her voice quiet, trying to hold back sobbing. “Does this mean I’m… that I’m going to be immortal?”

  
“Cursed between life and death, like your dear Timeless Child was? I’m not sure.” The Master’s hand runs up and down her back, sending electric sparks. “I suppose that’ll be a question you need to confront when you want to end your long voyage,” 

  
“I’ll find a way to get what I want,” Clara’s not sure who she’s trying to convince, herself or The Master. 

  
He places a surprisingly soft kiss on her lips. “I’m sure you will. We’ve always been more similar than you would like to admit, control freak.”

  
Maybe she would be like him, if she’d grown up with The Doctor and been twisted like he’d been by Rassilon. She’s not comfortable enough to say that it’s impossible. “I guess we are. I guess that’s why you like me so much.”

  
“Perhaps you’re not quite just a toy, Puppy,” The Master is soft, soft like he only can be to someone who serves as a reflection of him. “But at least you can stop blaming your Lady for your fate.”

  
“You know?” Clara raises an eyebrow.

  
“I can know everything going on in that pretty little head of yours,” The Master chuckles. “That’s why you like me so much.”

  
“Or why I hate you so much,” Clara retorts. It’s a fine line, after all. And her Doctor has been toeing it for their whole life with regards to Gallifrey. 


End file.
